I tried to start up Malwarebytes Anti-malware. It can usually find and clean things that antivirus programs miss. And I’m not talking a specific antivirus; McAfee, Norton, AVG, Kaspersky, Avast, you name it, they miss things.

It wouldn’t run. Cue more of a bad feeling. I’ve had experience with a certain virus/trojan that does not allow programs like Malwarebytes to run.

The next step was to start Windows in safe mode to try to keep the virus from running, which would hopefully allow me to try to clean it. First attempt was met with the message that I wasn’t allowed to force a safe boot because I wasn’t an administrator, which is entirely false. (Lecture me later on always running as an administrator.) Bad feeling gets even worse.

I already suspected that I had a variation of Vundo. Researching the different process names that my antivirus had tried to delete and/or block proved it. Vundo has a lot of variations, often manifesting itself as “Personal Antivirus” or “Antivirus 2009″ or some other bogus piece of crap. Some versions place “infected” files on a computer and then try to get people to pay money for their “antivirus” program which is guaranteed to remove the “infected” files. Other behaviors of the virus are disabling network cards, replacing screensavers and wallpapers with “warnings” and hiding the options to change them back, disabling antivirus programs, Windows updates, firewalls, and malware sweepers such as Malwarebytes. Often times a machine becomes so corrupted with files that keep recreating themselves that formatting is the only option for completely cleaning it. While researching I had managed to get the computer started in safe mode run Malwarebytes. It found several infected files which it said it fully removed but I still saw some unusual things in the running processes. I decided to reformat it.

Problem was we already had plans to go out of town for the weekend and I wasn’t able to start formatting until Sunday night. I got all of my things backed up then and got started with formatting and reinstalling Windows Monday night. Everything seemed to be going well except that while I was making preparations to back up I wanted to write down the models of my ethernet card, video card, etc so that I could later download any missing drivers. Quickest place to find the part names is usually device manager EXCEPT… the trojan hid every device from device manager. I thought no big deal, we can get it off of the motherboard later.

Except after we took the case off to look at the motherboard (it’s a custom built computer so I couldn’t just look it up on a manufacturer’s site) and then put everything back to start it up again it didn’t start. It typically beeped once if it was going to boot up. This time? No beep. No BIOS start up screen. In fact, nothing showed on the monitor. The fans were running so it was definitely getting power. We’ve tried all sorts of things; even taking all of the RAM out didn’t produce anything different.

Everything points to a dead motherboard. This does not please me in any way. Things started going wrong when the computer got the virus. I don’t even know how that happened, by the way. I keep my antivirus up to date; Avast has never failed me before. I keep Windows updates installed. I keep Java and Adobe reader updated. (Those two are more of a security risk than what they seem to be worth.) I even have Adblock Plus running most of the time so that ads can’t sneak anything malicious on my computer. The motherboard might have failed had we not been looking at it, trying to find out what drivers I needed but that wouldn’t have been necessary if that damn trojan had never wormed its way on my computer.

For now I am left using my 7 year old laptop that I got before I started college. Thankfully I kept all of my photos on a separate hard drive; they should be safe but I have no way to access that drive right now. I don’t know if we can try to fix my computer (I think that motherboard is no longer in production) or try to buy me a new laptop or desktop. See, my husband’s computer was having problems last November so he shipped it to his friend to have some parts replaced. The computer was damaged during shipping and we have been going back and forth ever since trying to get the insurance claim squared away and the check that should come along with it.

I am so disappointed. I had thought that maybe I could get another lens for my camera and/or purchase some needed software but NOPE. Disaster (ok that’s dramatic but ugh) strikes AGAIN. Every time it seems like we have an opportunity to buy something a little “extra” something else breaks. Or an emergency appendectomy is required but hey, that was completely necessary. Considering some of the other things that have been going on (which fall under the category of “I don’t talk about that because it’s work related”) I am just not thrilled about money at all right now. I guess, though, that this is what some people call first world problems? I mean, I do still have this laptop.

**The title is a reference to the series of posts I wrote when I was trying to get my computer fixed the last time the motherboard went *poof* It took at least three months to get the parts to replace it…

Thursday I came home a little early for lunch to find that we had missed the UPS delivery by about 20 minutes. The notice they left said that they would attempt another delivery on Friday. No one would be home then either. None of their automated menu options offered the choice to change the address a package was to be shipped to. Thanks to GetHuman I was able to bypass the automated system to get to an actual person who was able to change the address to my workplace. Once I got back from lunch on Friday I was told that I had a package at the campus post office. Since my computer was the only package I was expecting I knew it was it. Friday’s can be a little slow but this one (I was going to say yesterday but it’s technically Sunday since it is after midnight) seemed to drag just a little more. Once Michael picked me up from work it was back to the apartment to set everything up. Thankfully it arrived in one piece with no damage.

Michael helped me get it out of the box and connect all of the cables. I wasn’t too picky then about getting them as neat as computer cables can be so I spent a bit of time this morning straightening things up. So far it worked like a dream. I am still in awe of my monitor; I have room for all sorts of things. Whatever I’m working on in Photoshop won’t be half hidden by my toolbars anymore! I’m glad to have my music back as well as the rest of my files. I’ve spent a bit of time transferring things over from my laptop so that I don’t always have it booted and running as well. There’s still a bit to get transferred over but I’ve made a good dent in it. I think it’s going to take another day or so for my excitement to die down any.

Last week I decided that if I am going to be using my laptop for a much longer period that I had originally thought that I should upgrade the memory in it. I wanted to upgrade the memory a long time ago but I always convinced myself not to. It originally came with only 512MB. On Monday I finally ordered 2 sticks of 512MB ram. My laptop model will only support up to 1GB so this was fine. Once I received my tracking number I eagerly watched its status. Yesterday I saw that it was due to be delivered today. This was my first time ordering something from NewEgg but I only have positive things to say. The memory arrived today. I snapped it in on my lunch break and it works wonderfully. I have noticed a huge increase in performance so I’m very glad that I decided to upgrade. We’ll see how long it is before I get my desktop back but until then I’m happier about using my laptop.

I know in my last post regarding my computer situation I mentioned that I wanted to avoid reformatting my computer. Since then I’ve changed my mind. It’s been quite a while since I have reformatted it. There are several programs installed that I no longer use. Instead of burning all of my junk to CD I asked Michael to make a folder for me on his computer and share it so that I could just transfer everything over. This is the folder name he came up with. Apparently “laptop” became “lap” because the name was too long. I’ve just finished a double check of my files and programs and I believe I’m ready to format it. I have other reasons for wanting my computer to be in really good shape but I’m not quite ready to talk about it. I hope to get some things done this weekend so keep an eye out.

Your momma’s so skinny she has to run around in the shower just to get wet.

Why would I be remembering this particular joke from childhood? This story actually starts when we last moved. For the first few weeks I would never have enough hot water to take even a quick shower. Also the pipes squeal something terrible and the water pressure wasn’t the greatest. The hot water issue we were able to take care of: one of the elements in our hot water heater was out. So we were left with squealing pipes and less than desirable water pressure, though it was almost decent.

Except for the past few weeks. Some days I get lucky and I have amazing water pressure, but those days are becoming fewer and farther between. Now it seems that I’m lucky to get enough water pressure for the water to even get to the shower head. It has gotten so bad that I now have to ‘run around in the shower to get wet.’ Not because I’m the size of a toothpick but because the water barely makes it a foot past the shower wall, if that much. Good water pressure in the shower is definitely at the top of my ‘want’ list for a new apartment.

While my other computer is ‘in the shop’ I’ve been trying to work on my laptop some. I really want to avoid formatting it because that just seems like too much of a hassle, particularly without my other computer there for easy file transfer or even an external hard drive. So far I’ve defragmented it and used the Disk Cleanup utility. I remember a while back it seemed like my hard drive had filled up overnight. Mind you, the thing has a 40GB hard drive. I didn’t have many large files on it or anything. I got rid of some things but could never figure out where all the extra stuff was coming from. I found out when I ran disk defragmenter. It had found 2 files that it couldn’t process. Both were in \WINDOWS\Temp and both had to do with Lord of the Rings Online. When that game first came out I signed up to be a beta player and actually got in. Sadly my poor little laptop didn’t have the hardware to run in. Anyway, both of these files were ridiculously large: over 400MB each though I can’t remember exactly. So I took a little snoop through the Temp file and found similar files. Since I’ve had the game uninstalled for ages I decided to delete all of them. In doing so I freed up over 4GB of space. These weren’t game files, mind you. These were files that had been left sitting in the Temp folder. I really don’t get it. Shouldn’t Windows periodically clean out the temporary folder if the files stored there are, well, temporary?

Today I finally heard some news. The second replacement motherboard arrived. However, it arrived without a mount for the cooling fan for the CPU. Michael’s friend has since contacted the company and a mount is supposedly on its way. I don’t suppose if he knows if this new motherboard will resolve the issues or not because, well… it’s missing pieces. Such is the story of my life.

I haven’t received any updates since then so I really don’t know when it will be back on its way. I really hope that it’s soon because I’m trying to work on some new designs/themes and it’s a bit of a challenge with a smaller screen.

When I first got my computer around March 2007 I was ecstatic. My little Toshiba laptop had done me well throughout college but it was beginning to show its age. My husband (then fiance) got a new computer for me for my birthday, albeit I didn’t get it for a few months later. Almost immediately we realized that the Acer monitor had a major flaw: there was not enough space in the inset created for the DVI cable for it to properly connect. It took a bit of holding our tongues just the right way to get it to work. But once we finally got video everything was fine and continued to be fine. However, the ordeal would have to be repeated each time we moved. This I could deal with; it was only a slight annoyance.

After a while the monitor started to have other issues, namely burn in. Once I had been using a program for any length of time ghost images would be left when the program was closed. When the monitor was turned off for a while and then turned back on the ghost images would be gone and all was fine again, so I told myself no big deal, it’s not permanent, I can deal with it.

That was just the beginning.

About two months ago things started to get really bad. Something happened to my DVI cable or the slot. Every time I shut my keyboard tray or tapped the desk with my knee the monitor would no longer communicate signal to my computer. Some days it took me a half hour to reestablish the connection. Since all of our tax returns came in I decided to buy a new monitor. I had my eye on a 20″ Samsung until my sister called me to say that she had found a really good deal on a Samsung 220WM. I talked it over with Michael and it was decided: I was getting a new monitor. A nice, shiny, 22″ wide screen monitor. (See, I have a wide screen monitor at work. It’s a bit of an adjustment to go from seeing a wide screen all day and then using a square one.)

The week before we were to travel to my sister’s to get the monitor my computer started having issues. I had already switched monitors with Michael because it was impossible to get my computer to always connect to the monitor. As my video card had no VGA input I couldn’t switch and use VGA. This was far more serious than the monitor. At random times my computer would reboot. No “Windows is shutting down.” No blue screen of death. Nothing. Just a switch to a black screen, the beep my computer makes when starting up, and the Windows loading screen. I didn’t even get a “Windows was not shut down properly” message. Michael helped me with trouble shooting. At first he thought it was an overheating issue. At least, he did until it restarted within 5 minutes of turning it on. Eventually we determined that it was the motherboard.

To keep from making this much longer than it already is it took over a month to get the replacement motherboard in. It was still under warranty but it was a deal to get the replacement. Then, yesterday as Michael and I were coming back from lunch, a FedEx van pulled up to our apartment the same time we did. The guy had a DFI box in his hand. It was my motherboard. I was elated. Michael immediately went upstairs and said he’d have my computer up and running for me by the time I got back home from work. I went off with the very joyful thought that by the time I got home I’d finally be no longer relegated to using my now 5 year old laptop and, more importantly, finally be able to use my brand new monitor.

How wrong I was. Michael called me when he was booting it up for the first time. He got an error that I can’t remember right now but the computer didn’t work. The motherboard wasn’t the problem. He checked things out again, called his friend who had built the system for me, and determined that it must be the processor. I think I died a little inside. After another phone conversation they decided it would be best to ship the whole thing to his friend in Wisconsin.

So yes, if you saw any update from me yesterday about finally getting my motherboard it did not solve my issues. My computer will be on its way to Wisconsin later today. I hope to get it back before another month has passed. I suppose I should also say I hope to get it back in working condition. When I do get it back the saga will continue!

Since I seem to have a habit of writing mini-novels I’m going to tag them all with ‘saga.’ I think it’s fitting, though at present my categories and tags are not so entertaining. I’m still elbowing my way into a comfortable position here, I suppose.